


Fallout

by Kiiratam



Series: The Weissian Conspiracy [13]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Angst and Fluff and Smut, Canon Compliant, F/F, Kali doesn't appear, Weiss suffers, but this is her fault
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-09
Updated: 2019-10-09
Packaged: 2020-11-28 06:16:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20961848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kiiratam/pseuds/Kiiratam
Summary: Kali has a parting gift for her daughter, but she's entrusted it to Weiss to deliver.Takes place during Volume 6, Chapter 1, on the Argus Limited. (My BMBLB fic index)





	Fallout

"You didn't have to get me anything, Weiss." Blake took the wrapped package.

  
"I didn't." Weiss realized what she'd said, and how it could be taken, and hurried to add. "I mean, this isn't from me. It's from your mother. She asked me to give it to you once we were underway." She glanced out the window of the Argus Limited, as snow drifted down on the Mistral countryside.

  
It wasn't that she hadn't _wanted_ to get Blake something. Everyone, really. Weiss hadn't really understood how much her team - all of her Beacon friends - had meant to her, until she'd been torn away from them. Thrust back into the hollow, solitary life as the Heiress of the Schnee Dust Company. Not that she was heiress anymore. Which was _why_ Weiss hadn't gotten gifts for everyone.

  
She'd seen gifts for everyone. Now that she couldn't afford them, now that she was accounting for every lien, Weiss couldn't **stop** seeing perfect gifts.

  
Little dangly cookie earrings for Ruby. Clip-ons, since her ears weren't pierced. A cookbook of dog treats, though that one was more for Zwei, the precious baby. But Weis suspected that Ruby would have wanted to make them herself - the pictures had made them look like biscotti. Even if Ruby wasn't feeling adventurous, Weiss was pretty sure Ruby had never had biscotti. She hadn't seen anyone make it in Vale or Mistral, and she wanted to know if Ruby liked it.

  
For Blake, she'd seen a beautiful set of silver jewelry: hair pins, earrings, a delicate circlet, all to give the impression that that wearer's hair was the night sky. Blake had the inky black hair for it. It would have looked stunning. She didn't even know if Blake owned any jewelry. Kali had always worn those golden earrings - and Weiss had a sudden realization. Kali had made it so she couldn't hide anymore. Couldn't do the bow trick that she'd shared with her daughter. At least, not without taking out her jewelry.

  
And Yang - Yang _seemed_ like she'd be easy to shop for, but so little actually felt right. Weiss had strolled past a tattoo parlor, though, and had wondered. Maybe Yang had tattoos already, and she just hadn't noticed? ...That was ridiculous. They'd lived together for months. Whether she had wanted to or not, Weiss had seen almost all of Yang. But tattoos were expensive. And Yang already put so much of her lien into Bumblebee, maybe she was just prioritizing. Or, if Weiss really felt silver-tongued, she could take Yang to a hair salon.

  
Blake had unwrapped the package slowly, keeping the paper intact, neatly folding it, and setting it aside. "Did she tell you what it was?" It was just a plain black box. Sturdy cardboard, but no designs.

  
"Not a word." Weiss settled back on the edge of her bed. "She just said to give it to you when it was just the two of us, and when we had lost contact with the Haven network." Ruby and Yang had gone off to the observation car, and, Weiss suspected, for Ruby to run down a food trolley. They had dinner-plate-sized cookies.

  
Sighing, Blake said, "She wanted to make sure I couldn't call her and yell at her."

  
"That... is really obvious when you say it." And Weiss was ashamed to have gone along with Kali's plan without thinking. She knew that Kali and Blake's relationship had... rough spots, but it was so much better than what Weiss was used to. She may not have thought about how Blake would take it, though. "I'm sorry, Blake. I didn't consider-" Weiss paused, marshaling her words. "If it's bad, you can yell at me instead." Weiss trusted Kali, but she also wasn't her daughter. They'd known each other for two weeks. Even if they'd spoken more in those two weeks than Weiss had with her own mother in the past two years.

  
Weiss really - desperately - hoped that Kali hadn't made a mistake. Hadn't ruined Blake's opinion of both of them. Weiss had thought she had been doing so well. That she had been so clever, trying to get Blake and Yang back to how they'd been. Asking for Kali's help, bringing Ruby, and JNR, and Oscar, and Ilia, and Sun - everyone - together for one goal. Even if the two of them weren't the way they'd been, they were talking again. They were trying.

  
And Kali may have just upset RWBY's dynamic again. Using Weiss. _I really am just a lever in other people's hands. How can I be so naive? _ _Everyone's got a scheme. ...Maybe not Ruby._

  
Blake took a deep breath and flipped the box open. Blinked a few times. Slowly started turning red. But it wasn't anger, just... embarrassment. She pulled out a little note from the box, read it quickly. Sighing, Blake asked, "Do you want to see, Weiss?"

  
Absolutely. But. Weiss remembered what Kali had told her. To let Blake have space if she wanted it. "Only if you want to show me."

  
Covering her face with a hand, Blake closed the box and held it out for Weiss to take.

  
Ooooookay. That was a textbook mixed message. But she was curious. Really, _really_ curious. What could make Blake react like this? Baby pictures? Her early poetry?

  
Weiss took the box, and flipped it open. Inside was a well-crafted leather harness - it looked like part of a climbing harness, though weren't those usually made of synthetic fibers nowadays? And- oh. Oh! Weiss clutched her fingers on the sides of the box, so she wasn't tempted to reach out and touch the- Weiss forced herself to continue. If she couldn't even _think_ it... The dildo. She was pretty sure that was what it was called. It was only a penis if it was actually attached to someone. Weiss glanced back at the harness. Oh, that would just fit right like that, and... Weiss looked up at Blake.

  
"My own mother. I _cannot_ believe her."

  
This was outside of Weiss' field of expertise. Entirely outside. So far outside, she couldn't see her field from here. She couldn't _conceive_ of her field from here, it was so far away. She had needed to piece together the function of that sex toy from context clues. Weiss had never seen one. Even in the peeks she snuck in Blake's books. Though most of those were between people with different sexual organs, and this was one designed for-

  
Weiss had to stop herself._ Say something, commiserate, anything._ "Maybe she's just trying to help?" _Maybe not that._ Weiss made herself close the box. Having it in her vision wasn't helping. Especially since her imagination was busily churning away, even if most the details were fuzzy. Would Blake wear it, or-?

  
Blake fumed. "She's always trying to help! I just wish she'd _ask_ first!"

  
"Parents always think they know best." _If they cared at all. Or knew what was best for **them**, and you should do it and **smile** while you did it._

  
"It's not that hard! 'Blake, do you think you're going to need to rail your friend?' 'Oh, I don't know, mother, we're still stuck on the 'my ex nearly killed both of us, and I don't know if she still likes me' stage!'"

  
Weiss swallowed, tried to keep her posture straight and proper. She knew that Blake wasn't yelling at her. But they'd had fights before, and being able to yell back helped. Listening to someone else rant, especially when you couldn't do anything, and it was your fault that the yelling was happening at all...

  
Standing up, Blake paced back and forth in the cabin, ears twitching. "She always does this! Just makes a plan, and expects me to know what it is, and what _I'm_ supposed to do, and never asks me about _any_ of it! No wonder Tukson broke up with her! I don't know how Dad _stands_ her, sometimes! I don't know how Sienna put up with her meddling for as long as she did!"

  
Weiss blinked. Sienna? Sienna _Khan_? Was Blake on a first name basis with _all_ the leaders of the White Fang?

  
"At least Adam told me what I was supposed to do!"

  
It just slipped out, Weiss couldn't stop it. "Blake?!" It just hung in the air, a half-strangled expression of shock.

  
Blake's ears drooped. "I... There was a _reason_ I left, Weiss, and it wasn't just because I was a lovesick child. It didn't help, but I was tired of just... not knowing. Having to trust my parent's judgment if the protests were working, if we needed to move on. Adam offered certainty. In a fight, it's obvious who won. Even to a dumb kid like me." She slumped back against the window. "We were at a protest once where they fired gas grenades into the crowd, and afterwards, my parents were so _happy_ because we'd won. The media circus over it made the government stop enforcing the latest petty law discriminating against Faunus. I don't even remember what it was. I do remember crawling into an alley, and hiding behind a dumpster until I stopped crying and throwing up." Blake sat down, hands framing her face.

  
Arm pressed against her stomach, Weiss slid out of her perch on the side of the bed, knelt down next to Blake. "I'm sorry."

  
"You-" Blake bit off whatever she was going to say, looking away. "You were a lot easier to hate when I first met you."

  
"Do you want me to leave? I can go get Yang-" Weiss started to stand up.

  
Blake reached out and touched her hand. "Yang's got her own problems. And this is one of my old ones. It's okay."

  
Settling back down, Weiss looked directly into her friend's eyes. "We can send it back to your mother. And I can write a letter to her, explaining-"

  
Blowing out a breath, Blake shook her head. "The worst part about my mom? She's usually right. I'll keep it."

  
Well, at least there wasn't any question of Blake being in love with Yang.

  
"Still. Have you told her all of this?"

  
"She knows." Blake's ears flattened. "She always knows."

  
Weiss was determined. "But have you actually told her? Aren't you doing the same thing back to her?"

  
"It's her fault."

  
"So be better than her!" Weiss put her hand to her mouth. That had come out... much harsher than she had intended.

  
Blake's glare softened, despite that. She closed her eyes, and opened them slowly. "...All right. I'll try to write something before we get to Argus." Her ears quirked, and she stood up quickly. Blake hid the folded wrapping paper under her pillow, and grabbed the box.

  
By now, Weiss could hear Ruby outside, starting to turn the doorknob. Blake was turning to stuff the box into her luggage, but she didn't have enough space.

  
Weiss put a Glyph on the doorknob, preventing it from turning. She pointed at her own luggage, mouthed 'just stick it in mine.'

  
Ruby rapped on the door. "Weiss, Blake? Did you lock the door? We have cookies! Well, cookie."

  
"Maybe it's just stuck, sis?"

  
Weiss started for the door, as Blake put the box away, and zipped away to her own bed, pulling out a book. "Coming!" She pulled the door open. "Sorry, Ruby. Something was in the way."

  
"Yeah, yeah, c'mon you two. Yang won't let me eat this by myself," Ruby gestured with what Weis had thought was a platter, but was actually just one enormous cookie. "So we're going to eat it **as a team**."

  
Yang snorted. Weiss looked up at her, images of Yang and Blake... cavorting... in her head. Kali may have sent it to Blake, but maybe she wasn't supposed to wear it...

  
Focus. There were important matters at hand. Weiss looked at Ruby, who was unwrapping the giant cookie on the pull-out table. ...Well, maybe not _important_ important. Important enough.


End file.
